Regional Theatre

Ben Howlett Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Will Quince]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend that we cannot put a price on social cohesion and integration with communities. It is a crying shame that so many former theatres now belong to Wetherspoon and other pub chains or are now cinemas. Once we lose our regional venues, they are lost for ever to commercial ventures. I totally support the point made by my hon. Friend.

We are in tough financial times and the Government still have a sizeable deficit to eliminate. The pot of money that the Arts Council and the Government have at their disposal is not limitless. However, it was very encouraging to see the Chancellor increase the cash going to the Arts Council at the autumn statement by around £10 million a year. I hope this generous increase in funding will help the Arts Council to fund some great restoration and innovative projects in our subsidised regional theatres outside London.

Let us think about what the extra money could do in our regional theatres. In the previous Parliament, there were small cash cuts to theatres in receipt of more than £250,000 a year. However, BBC research on 62 of those subsidised UK theatre companies between 2009 and 2014 produced encouraging results. It found that those theatre companies were producing more plays, increasing production levels and introducing new writing. It is fantastic to see our theatres defying expectations and being innovative to boost funding streams and new productions.

Such good news is reinforced by recent box office ticket numbers from UK Theatre, which show that total audience numbers, performances and ticket takes are all up on the previous year. However, the report shows that there are still severe challenges ahead for regional theatre. The big family musicals that we all know and love dominate our regional scene, accounting for £1 in every £4 taken at UK theatre box offices.

Moreover, overall ticket sales for plays fell by 278,000 in 2014, and on average auditoria were only half full. Equally, the category of auditoria of principally producing theatres—theatres that produce most of their own work, like the Mercury in Colchester—saw a decline in performances and ticket sales in the past year. Although I am delighted to say that the Mercury bucks that trend with 10% audience growth in the past year, there is a national pattern, which we ignore at our peril.

[Ben Howlett (Bath) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on presenting this debate today. I was a frequent visitor to the Mercury in my early years, so it is a privilege to be able to intervene in today’s debate. My constituency has the Theatre Royal, which, like the Mercury, creates its own productions. Does he agree that the matter is not simply about subsidies, but about reducing subsidies owing to the current economic times? We need to look at the excellent work of the previous Parliament in allowing tax credits to enable productions to happen, thus enabling regional theatre to pump more money into local communities to educate people and also help younger people to access theatres.

[Will Quince]

My hon. Friend makes a really good point. There are innovative ways of funding regional arts and theatre, and Government subsidy is not the only option. Having said that, it will take time. We have already seen 6% year-on-year growth, so we know the subsidies are coming down. Regional theatres are doing better and better every year and doing more and more in their local communities, but for the time being, subsidy is still required to ensure that those excellent facilities and the service they provide are maintained.

I hope I have been able to do this important topic justice in such a short space of time. We should be proud of having such a strong theatre scene in our capital, but great culture and theatre is not only for the great and the good in London. When regional theatre does well, our whole cultural scene benefits. Audiences have greater access to quality theatre; budding performers and writers have the chance to innovate and partake in new material; and the local economy is boosted. No one could accuse the Culture Minister of missing an opportunity to take the stage, and I look forward to hearing his response on what we can do to develop regional theatre and ensure it gets its fair share of funding to inspire a new generation to visit and partake in our country’s theatre scene.